The Common Ills: Iraq snapshot

Thursday, July 20, 2017

Iraq snapshot

Thursday, July 20, 2017.

Since the discussion of human rights abuses -- War Crimes -- entered the press conversation regarding Mosul last week, there has been silence from the US government.

Turns out not all leaders of government are being silent. REUTERS reports:

German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Wednesday urged Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to investigate alleged human rights abuses that occurred during military operations to regain control of the city of Mosul from Islamic State militants.
Merkel telephoned al-Abadi to congratulate him on the victory of U.S.-backed Iraqi forces in Mosul, calling it a "big step forward in the fight against Islamic State," her spokesman Steffen Seibert said in a statement.

The German leader also encouraged Abadi to investigate claims of human rights abuses that emerged after the military operations, Seibert said.

Hayder al-Abadi is the prime minister of Iraq.

He has not set a good example and his record is appalling.

This was noted by Human Rights Watch yesterday:

International observers have discovered an execution site in west Mosul, Human Rights Watch said today. That report, combined with new statements about executions in and around Mosul’s Old City and persistent documentation about Iraqi forces extrajudicially killing men fleeing Mosul in the final phase of the battle against the Islamic State (also known as ISIS), are an urgent call to action by the Iraqi government.

Despite repeated promises to investigate wrongdoing by security forces, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has yet to demonstrate that Iraqi authorities have held a single soldier accountable for murdering, torturing, and abusing Iraqis in this conflict.

“As Prime Minister Abadi enjoys victory in Mosul, he is ignoring the flood of evidence of his soldiers committing vicious war crimes in the very city he’s promised to liberate,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “Abadi’s victory will collapse unless he takes concrete steps to end the grotesque abuses by his own security forces.”

Despite repeated promises . . .

That is his record.

The same one as Nouri al-Maliki had before him.

Merkel has called out the abuses.

The US government has not.

Gwynne Dyer (RED DEER ADVOCATE) observes:

The shooting was still going on down by the river last week when Iraq’s Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi dropped by and prematurely declared that the battle for Mosul was over. He was misled by the various Iraqi army, police and militia units who were competing with one another to declare victory first, but now it really is over – and there is little left of Mosul.

The siege began on 17 October of last year, so it lasted nine months – longer than the Battle of Stalingrad. It probably killed more civilians, too, because the US-led air forces were used to compensate for the shortage of trained and motivated Iraqi ground forces.

On the issue of media coverage, Adam Johnson (FAIR) offers an analysis which includes:

Earlier this week, human rights group Amnesty International issued a lengthy report accusing US-backed forces of “repeated violations of international humanitarian law, some of which may amount to war crimes,” in Mosul, Iraq, causing the deaths of at least 3,700 civilians. Neither this report, nor the broader issue of the civilian toll in the US war against ISIS, has come close to penetrating US corporate media.
The only major radio or television outlet to report on Amnesty’s claims was NPR (7/12/17). While traditional print outlets, such as the New York Times and Washington Post, did run Reuters (7/11/17) and AP (7/12/17) articles, respectively, on the report, neither covered it themselves. Neither Amnesty’s charges, nor the broader issue of civilian deaths in Mosul, garnered any coverage in television news, with no mention on ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN or MSNBC.

The expulsion of ISIS from Mosul by the US-led coalition did receive coverage, but the US role in killing civilians was uniformly ignored.

Amnesty International actually issued the report two weeks ago (this snapshot was the first time we mentioned it).

The silence isn't just over broadcast media, it's also in State Dept press briefings. Mosul was frequently mentioned

The Amnesty report?

Nope.

The abuses?

Nope.

These are not broadcasts.

No reporter can whine, "My producer wouldn't air it."

This is when reporters can ask anything.

And they chose to ignore the issue.

They refused to press the US government on what was taking place.

It's exactly these moments that go to why the press is not respected.

They are pretending to do so much but they do so little.

Let's not this upcoming event.

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